{WHILE THE SUN SHINES}

 

 "Make hay while the sun shines." It's a centuries-old adage that's been floating around my mind frequently here lately. The meaning is simple and can be summed up in another proverb: Never put off til tomorrow what you can do today.

I don't know why I've been mulling it over so much. I suppose it's because April showers have showed up right on time and I find myself saying, "I'd better hang wash while the sun shines." I love hanging laundry out on my wash line, and Spring is making that a little bit difficult. 

So I hang it when the sun shines. 

My life feels so busy right now and yet I feel like I'm missing out on a lot somehow. For instance, how can I not have enough hours in the day to do all the things I need to do and yet feel that I spent too many hours doing those things? 

My kids are growing so fast and I feel like each day is a struggle between spending time playing, building, or reading with them and the work, work, work that it takes to keep a household going properly. I started spring cleaning and I don't even want to finish because I feel like I don't have the time to. 

I know what you're thinking- "It's just a busy season." I know because I've thought it too. But I'm beginning to wonder if there is ever a not-busy-season. Please, more experienced friends, tell me if there is. 

My sister and I talked about this the other day and she told me she read about a mom who simply took a few minutes here and there, no matter what she was doing, and spent those minutes with her kids when they'd ask her to. Just dropped the chore or project and connected. I feel like this attitude is making hay while the sun shines.

Hay can only be harvested for a short season. Children are only children for a short season. It may be the busiest of busy seasons but it is SHORT. I've only been a mom for five years and I already know this because I can't believe that my son will be starting school this Fall. His toddler "season" is over soon. Already. 

It's hard to have the right spirit to "make hay" when what I really want is a moment to myself. I have to remind myself that they will only be little once. The laundry and the dishes, the sweeping and the dusting, the spring cleaning and the mending; these will never go out of season. The work will always be there. The children will not. 

I don't want to get so caught up in cleaning that I miss living my children's childhood with them. I'm fighting the stress of a slightly messy home so that I can try to make my kids smile instead of hurting their feelings because I won't play dollhouse or build lego with them. It's not always easy to "make hay", but when you see the moments you miss, "making hay" suddenly seems not more important, but most important.

Last night, while I was inside washing the dishes and straightening up the dining room, Reuben learned how to ride his bike with training wheels. Seriously, in one night. I've worked at teaching him how to pedal but he never really got the hang of it and then suddenly he can ride and bike and pedal and steer and brake and 

I missed it. I missed watching him do it for the very first time. I watched him today, amazed that he had learned how so quickly. And I realized again that I may have missed a hay-making moment. 

But I'll try to catch the next one. 

While the sun shines.